The future perfect simple and continuous

  • B2 · Upper-intermediate
  • Grammar lesson
  • 60 min

The future perfect simple (When she leaves, she will have ridden the bus more than a hundred times) and continuous (she will have been living with the family for fourteen months): what will be finished, and how long something will have lasted. By, by the time, by or until? From a guide dog puppy's year with a family to an imagined challenge of your own.

Teach this lessonDownload PDF

Free, no card needed. The PDF has every slide, the homework and an answer key.

will have closedwill have beenby the time

What's in the lesson

  1. 1Warm-up
  2. 2Reading: fourteen months with MapleReading comprehension
  3. 3What does it focus on?Grammar exercise
  4. 4Find the future perfectGrammar exercise
  5. 5The future perfect: simple and continuousGrammar rule
  6. 6Simple or continuous?Grammar exercise
  7. 7The end of the seasonGrammar exercise
  8. 8Questions for your teacherGrammar exercise
  9. 9Say it naturallySpeaking practice
  10. 10The big challengeSpeaking practice
  11. 11About youGrammar exercise
  12. 12Wrap-up

Homework

  1. 1Homework: the first sweaterGrammar exercise
  2. 2Homework: choose the right formGrammar exercise
  3. 3Homework: the day it is doneDiscussion

Two slides from the lesson

Warm-up

A few questions about you before we start.

  1. Have you ever looked after a pet that wasn't yours? How did it go?
  2. What is something you do every morning without fail?
  3. What do you think will be different in your daily life a year from now?

Grammar rule

The future perfect: simple and continuous

Future perfect simpleFuture perfect continuous
Formwill have + past participle (done)will have been + -ing (doing)
Usefinished before a future time; how much, how manyhow long an activity will have lasted at a future time
ExampleBy December, the museum will have welcomed a million visitors.By the time dessert arrives, Grandpa will have been telling the same story for an hour.
NegativeOur new manager won't have started by then.We won't have been living here long.
QuestionWill the store have closed by nine?How long will she have been coaching the team?

Time words

by + a time (by Monday, by then, by the end of the year) · by the time / before / when + the present simple: When the movie comes out, millions of people will have seen the trailer. (not when the movie will come out: the future goes in one part of the sentence only)

If the time part comes first, use a comma: By the time the snow melts, we'll have finished the new porch. · We'll have finished the new porch by the time the snow melts.

Both forms, or only one?

With live, work, study, train + for, both forms are fine: By August, Kenji will have studied / will have been studying music for twenty years. State verbs (know, be, own, belong, have = own) usually stay simple: Next month, I'll have had this phone for five years.

by ≠ until: Send me the photos by Friday (on Friday or before, not later). We'll be on vacation until the 15th (all the time up to the 15th).

Teach it live with video and a whiteboard, or print it: the PDF has every slide, the homework and the answers.

Teach this lesson
← Unit 2Putting things off